Press Releases

On Saturday September 11, terrorists yet again breached the security of a military facility, this time, the Forward Operating Base (FOB), Mutumji, Dansadau Local Government Area of Zamfara State. No fewer than 12 officers were feared dead in the attack. The attack at Mutumji is coming few weeks after terrorists attacked Nigeria’s elite military training institution, Nigeria Defence Academy (NDA), Afaka campus, Kaduna State and killed two officers, Lt- Commander Wulah and Flt- Lt Okoronkwo, while Major Christopher Datong was abducted. It has been over two weeks since Major Datong was abducted and the terrorists holding on to him have reportedly demanded a ransom payment from the military to release him.

The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC), Nigeria’s broadcast regulatory agency, has issued a formal query to Channels Television Station over an interview granted by Governor Samuel Ortom on the station’s current affairs programme, Sunrise Daily. 

Governor Ortom while answering questions on moves by the Federal Government to reactivate the colonial-era grazing routes and reserves, made very specific allegations against the President Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government for indulging Fulani herdsmen and condoning their unrestrained killing of other Nigerians. He voiced his opposition to the policy and declared that he would not hesitate to approach the Courts to challenge the Federal government if it insisted on creating grazing routes in Benue State.

The ongoing industrial action by the National Association of Resident Doctors (NARD) was clearly avoidable and most regrettable. According to the leadership of the association, it took the union 113 days of cold shoulder treatment and no sign of seriousness by the Federal Government to honour the Memorandum of Agreement (MOA), signed in April, 2021 before the association was forced to withdraw its members’ services.

On Saturday, 14th August, 2021, Muslim pilgrims from Ondo State were attacked by armed men at Rukuba Road, Off Gada-Biyu in Jos North Local Government Area of Plateau State. Twenty-two of these innocent travellers were reportedly killed, 14 were injured and many are still missing in this unexplained attack. Eye-witness accounts indicate that they were waylaid, forced to disembark from their buses and then massacred in a most brutal manner.

The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) has launched yet another blatant assault on press freedom as part of a series of attempts to gag the Nigerian Media. The regulatory body had in a letter titled: “Newspaper Reviews and Current Affairs Programme”, ordered Radio and Television stations not to “divulge” details of bandits, kidnappers, and terrorists during daily Newspaper Reviews.

Ordinarily the Nigerian Senate's rejection of Ms Lauretta Onochie, a Presidential aide, as a Commissioner of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) should be a victory for democracy and for Nigerians in general. It ought to have signposted a refreshing hope for the increasing role of public opinion and social advocacy in the continuing struggle to shape and enthrone democratic ethos and tenets in our polity.

On Monday, 5th July 2021, Nigerians were again rudely shaken by news of the abduction of 121 students of Bethel Baptist High School, Maramara in Chikun Local Government Area of Kaduna State.

These latest victims of marauding bandits have joined the long list of schoolchildren that have been abducted in Nigeria.

We note with keen interest the recent 2021 CAF World Giving Index report which ranked Nigerians third in the world. The report, “World Giving Index 2021: A Global Pandemic Report”, published by the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF), United Kingdom, is an analysis of “charitable behaviour around the globe”.

According to CAF, this 10th edition of its giving index “provides a decade’s worth of combined insight” from looking at “three aspects of giving behaviour”: helping strangers or people we do not know, donating money to charities and volunteering time to a charitable non-governmental organisation.